Calvin Robinson: A patient’s right to fight

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Today is Thursday, September 28th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Myrna Brown.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Up next: a tragedy in Great Britain.

On September 12th, a young woman named Sudiksha Thirumalesh died in a British hospital. Until then, she was known simply as Patient ST.

WORLD Opinions Commentator Calvin Robinson says the story behind “Patient ST” illustrates the life and death stakes of putting healthcare decisions in the hands of politicians.

CALVIN ROBINSON, COMMENTATOR: Recently, I began my TV program on GB News by talking about Patient ST, a 19-year-old girl with a degenerative illness who wanted to live. Her National Health Service doctors said she was “actively dying” and therefore wanted to withhold treatment. She wanted to die fighting to live.

Two psychiatrists deemed her compos mentis, willing and able to decide for herself. However, ST’s medical doctors took her to court and the judge not only agreed with her doctors, but slammed a gag order on Patient ST, which meant she could not talk about her condition publicly. She could not even identify herself.

This state-overreach meant Patient ST could not appeal for crowdfunding to send her over to Canada to join an experimental trial. It also meant she could not ask people to pray for her by name.

Unfortunately, we did not get the opportunity to help Patient ST as we had hoped. Patient ST died a few days ago.

As I understand it, her family will continue to fight, and good for them. But how did we get into a position where the state assumes control over not only how we live, but how and when we die?

I keep hearing this soulless argument about “quality of life” as if a human life is only worth living if it reaches a particular abstract measure of what another human determines as quality.

Have you ever wondered why you don’t see as many young people with Down syndrome these days? That is because in England, and many other places across the West, it is entirely legal to kill an unborn baby if he or she has a disability, because so-called medical professionals judge them to have a lower “quality of life” than the rest of us. How dare they? Who are any of us to judge whether someone else deserves to live, based on our own expectations of what it means to live a quality life? I know many happy, successful, and joyful men and women with Down syndrome and other life-altering disabilities.

Of course, the other reason the NHS is hesitant to continue to treat people like Patient ST is the cost implications. This is always the danger with state healthcare. Each human being has a price tag over their heads—a point at which it is no longer financially viable to continue caring for someone.

Surely, at this point, we have to put the spreadsheets away and address the basic ethical question of: Is this the right thing to do?

But then that is a difficult question to ask, when as a country, as a Western society, we have done away with our moral compass. This is what happens when a nation decides it no longer needs to follow Christ. We ditched Christ, and put the NHS in His place. I would say that is not working out so well for us at the moment. Is it too late for us to change our minds?

I’m Calvin Robinson.

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